For-Profit Religion + Real Estate: LDS Church outbids Bill Gates > Real Estate Shopping Spree Price Tag $357M

Nothing says it better than this post:

LDS CHURCH'S $357,000,000.00 MILLION REAL ESTATE SHOPPING SPREE

"Two huge commercial real estate properties were purchased this past week by the LDS Church through their real estate companies, Hawaii Reserves LLC and Farm Land Reserves.  The LDS Church purchase a resort hotel on the island of Maui for 149 Million dollars and thousands of acres of land in Washington State for 209 Million dollars. 

Total price tag for this week's real estate shopping spree: 357,000,000.00.

What I find so interesting is that not even Bill Gates came up with enough money to win the bid over the LDS Church to purchase the land in Washington State. Here are the news articles.   

LDS Church outbids Bill Gates in bid for bankrupt Easterday Assets

https://www.dtnpf.com/agriculture/web/ag/news/business-inputs/article/2021/06/23/mormon-church-group-outbids-bill

and this
MARRIOTT FAMILY-OWNED

It was reported this week that the LDS Church purchased a resort hotel on the island of Maui for 148,000,000.00 dollars. Here is the link to the business journal article.   The resort hotel was completed in 2016.

The Church believes it has the responsibility to invest their money wisely and this includes investing in the stock market and buying and managing real estate. This hotel that rents for almost 1000.00 a night is the latest real estate holding they have acquired. 

I would assume that most members would have a hard time believing this. They might say, well it is not actually the church that bought it, but an "affiliate" of the Church. Well, the definition of affiliate is an officially attached or connected (a subsidiary group or a person) to the organization. 

Sidenote: 

What is interesting is that these business deals are never reported to the LDS members. However giving money to help Black Americans is all over the national and local Church News. While that is great to help the NAACP organization (which happens to promote Critical Race Theory) is less than 3 percent of what they spent on real estate this past week.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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08 March 2020

For-Profit Enterprise Schemes / The Tax-Exempt Mormon Church

Nope

Report: Mormon church investment fund had nearly $38 billion

Updated 2:40 pm CST, Saturday, March 7, 2020

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — The Church of Jesus Chris of Latter-day Saints' largest investment fund had nearly $38 billion in stocks and mutual funds at the end of 2019, according to a filing that sheds new light on the faith's finances.
The fund called Ensign Peak Advisors submitted a filing to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Feb. 14.
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Link > https://www.scribd.com/document/450143097/Ensign-Peak-Advisors-Stock-Holdings 
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The church also owned $930 million in Google stock and $855 million in Amazon.
Mormon Church Moves Public Stock Holdings to Single Entity
Published March 7, 2020 15:03 pm PST
Source > Truth & Transparency

"This morning, the Salt Lake Tribune reported that Ensign Peak Advisors, the investment arm of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, reported a total of $38.7 billion of holdings in the U.S. stock market.

 

Truth & Transparency first reported on this topic in May 2018 by uncovering $32 billion traded by 13 shell companies connected to the Church, and again last month when revealing the increased value of those shell companies as well as venture capital investments made by another shell company connected to the Church.

 

Last month, in another unprecedented move, the Church gave an exclusive interview to the Wall Street Journal discussing the portfolio, admitting to having intentionally obfuscated the paper trail with the shell companies discovered by Truth & Transparency. They feared that members would reduce their tithing donations to the Church.

Today’s story from the Tribune implies that this $38 billion is in addition to the money already reported by Truth & Transparency saying that Ensign Peak’s portfolio is “more diversified than any of those smaller funds.” However, closer analysis of the data suggests otherwise.. .